Posts by Cassius

Episode 176 of the podcast is now available!

Thanks Don. As i said i left some of the discussion in the podcast, and it will be interesting to hear what other people think.

At the moment I am thinking that since the theme of the section revolves around the possibility of continuous pleasure / happiness, and that Epicurus' opponents would have wanted to argue that happiness is not possible while being tortured, and that the imagery is intended to stress that point - that continuous happiness is NOT possible in life due to events such as torture (and no doubt other much lesser pains). Thus to the effect that 'happiness" cannot accompany the victim as he walks up the scaffold to the torture/execution. That somewhere along the way happiness leaves the victim while he is still alive, and thus they seek to prove their argument that happiness/pleasure cannot be continuously present in life.

That interpretation would seem consistent with the importance that these guys attached to Epicurus contention (and to their intense desire to refute it) that continuous pleasure is possible.

But i will be very interested to hear what others think.

Closing in (hopefully) in completing editing of this episode, I am going to cut out a lengthy tangent in which we tried (pretty unsuccessfully) to decode Cicero's statement in Tusculun Disputations 5.9.24-25 (attributed to Theophrastus, I think?) to the effect that:

"the happy life cannot mount the scaffold to the wheel"

Rather than delete it entirely, however, I want to preserve it here, because DeWitt mentions it in this section and it would probably be a good idea to get a grip on the meaning.

EDIT - I am going to leave some of it in. I think Joshua comes up with the right interpretation, that the issue is that of mounting the steps to one's execution, to which we can attach the first part -- that Theophrastus may be alleging that the "happy man" cannot continue to be happy when he is undergoing execution. Perhaps.

Santa Claus would be proud!

I think the line from Torquatus referenced above deserves emphasis for a while, and I've added it to a rotation for the top of the front page. Here is the Latin of Torquatus' response to Cicero:

"Non prorsus," inquit, "omnesque qui sine dolore sint in voluptate, et ea quidem summa, esse dico."

Pretty clear and direct and without much effort to massage into good English:

All who are without pain are in pleasure, and in that which [is] highest!

Omnes qui sine dolore sint in voluptate, et ea quidem summa.

I may never be able to remember the Greek version, but that Latin I think i can remember

Added May 31, 2023:

Cicero: Who can fail to see that there are in the nature of things these three states: one when we are in pleasure, another when we are in pain, the the third, the state in which I am now, and I suppose you too, when we are neither in pain nor in pleasure? ... Do you not see that between these extremes lies a great crowd of men who feel neither delight nor sorrow?" Torquatus: "Not at all, and I affirm that all who are without pain are in pleasure, and in that the fullest possible!" - Cicero;'s On Ends, Book 2 (V)16

Not having read this thread in a while, doing so now is a good refresher.

This thread is still in "General Discussion" but we'll probably move it to a Canonics section to help reduce the nature of the disagreement to a form that is graspable. Possibly we need a full thread on Neoplatonism, if we don't have one already. And part of that would be to have an understanding of why it us referred to "Neo" as opposed to simply Platonism - seems for our Epicurean purposes they are hard to distinguish.

Plotinus's Relation to Plato[edit]

See also: Allegorical interpretations of Plato

For several centuries after the Protestant Reformation, neoplatonism was condemned as a decadent and 'oriental' distortion of Platonism. In a 1929 essay, E. R. Dodds showed that key conceptions of neoplatonism could be traced from their origin in Plato's dialogues, through his immediate followers (e.g., Speusippus) and the neopythagoreans, to Plotinus and the neoplatonists. Thus Plotinus' philosophy was, he argued, 'not the starting-point of neoplatonism but its intellectual culmination.'^[30] Further research reinforced this view and by 1954 Merlan could say 'The present tendency is toward bridging rather than widening the gap separating Platonism from neoplatonism.'^[31]

Since the 1950s, the Tübingen School of Plato interpretation has argued that the so-called 'unwritten doctrines' of Plato debated by Aristotle and the Old Academy strongly resemble Plotinus's metaphysics. In this case, the neoplatonic reading of Plato would be, at least in this central area, historically justified. This implies that neoplatonism is less of an innovation than it appears without the recognition of Plato's unwritten doctrines. Advocates of the Tübingen School emphasize this advantage of their interpretation. They see Plotinus as advancing a tradition of thought begun by Plato himself. Plotinus's metaphysics, at least in broad outline, was therefore already familiar to the first generation of Plato's students. This confirms Plotinus' own view, for he considered himself not the inventor of a system but the faithful interpreter of Plato's doctrines.^[32]

Plotinus - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

I am sure that *I* am more confused so I am glad you have not let it go. Looking for the word in other settings would seem to be the best approach.

I am completely unread in Plotinus so this is interesting to me - thanks.

But one thing I can say is that I hope it won't be another year before you ramble here again!

Editing of this episode is not complete but is going pretty well. I do see that I need to apologize however that I was sick for this episode and my congestion comes through - so please remember when you start listening to it that both Don and Joshua were present for this podcast, as well as Martin and Kalosyni, and once you get past my initial introduction the rest of the podcasters pick up the slack very nicely.

Thanks Tau Phi, good to see that there is anoher variation out there in the "standard" versions.

When I get asked the question next time about "which book to read first" I am going to expand it further by including "A Few Days In Athens" in the list.

Unfortunately for AFDIA, chapter one is probably the least interesting of the whole book. However it does convey, in a 19th century "flowery" way, that what follows is an interesting fictional story, and sometimes people are in the mind to be told an action story rather than just reading non-fiction all the time. And what AFDIA has going for it is that after you get past the first chapter, it does pack in a lot of thought-provoking material about key issues about how Epicurus contrasts with Stoicism, so I think it's well worth reading and probably conveys a better sense of the "earnestness" of the ancient school and some of it's less-talked-about-but-still-important issues than a lot of people give it credit for.

It would be nice to expand the list further and say "read at least the first couple of pages of Lucretius" but I have yet to find many people who aren't thrown into confusion by the many translation and poetry and topic issues that are involved in getting started with it. Lucretius ends up being probably the most reliable of all sources on the full scope of the philosophy, but the hardest to take in on first reading.

Quote from Elli

And what a stoic/platonean idea is this really to use metaphors for the feelings? Cassius what do you say for the issue on the enjoyments are they OUT or IN of LIMITS? How we measure according to hedonic calculus ? Are there limits or not which are PERSONAL of course, and why is needed to use metaphorical terms for speaking and describing the FEELINGS? Feelings are our faculty, from the day we were born, we feel them immediately and without mistake in accordance with the circumstances (place and time) and are unique for everyone!

Elli I wonder here if you are saying that "limits" apply more to "desires" than to "feelings"? That would be an interesting direction to go, with desires being intellectual and requiring intellectual limitation (?)

Just for the record too, I guess we could consider asking Peter St Andre directly about his thoughts. I have never had any communication with him in the past so I am not aware whether he is reachable or not.

One more quick thought -- We (at least I) don't often express the problem of excessive minimalism or excessive frugality as a problem of being "out of limit," but I would say when you think about it yes it's exactly the same issue involved in pursuing certain desires for excitement beyond their natural limit.

It makes sense to me that there is a natural limit of how long we can live, and how much action and pleasure we can try to engage in, and also a natural limit as to how little action we can try to engage in. Lying down indefinitely in the pursuit of tranquility is as against the limits of what nature requires as would be jumping off a mountain for the thrill of the experience. Nature's limits aren't written in stone but in the consequences that will follow certain behaviors if carried to an extreme.

This probably doesn't help the discussion much, but I think it is a good idea to look for parallels in other texts, as we have done in VS63 and VS11, and I would add to those this from Torquatus in Book 1 of On Ends. I have underlined below the part that I see these same two errors (which using Elli's terms could be seen as failure to adhere to the limits and go overboard in either luxury or minimalism). So it seems to me that it is reasonable to look for such contrasts being made, even if we don't find it in this particularly phrasing of the letter to Menoeceus:

Quote from Torquatus

[32] X. But that I may make plain to you the source of all the mistakes made by those who inveigh against pleasure and eulogize pain, I will unfold the whole system and will set before you the very language held by that great discoverer of truth and that master-builder, if I may style him so, of the life of happiness. Surely no one recoils from or dislikes or avoids pleasure in itself because it is pleasure, but because great pains come upon those who do not know how to follow pleasure rationally. Nor again is there any one who loves or pursues or wishes to win pain on its own account, merely because it is pain, but rather because circumstances sometimes occur which compel him to seek some great pleasure at the cost of exertion and pain. To come down to petty details, who among us ever undertakes any toilsome bodily exercise, except in the hope of gaining some advantage from it? Who again would have any right to reproach either a man who desires to be surrounded by pleasure unaccompanied by any annoyance, or another man who shrinks from any pain which is not productive of pleasure?

[33] But in truth we do blame and deem most deserving of righteous hatred the men who, enervated and depraved by the fascination of momentary pleasures, do not foresee the pains and troubles which are sure to befall them, because they are blinded by desire, and in the same error are involved those who prove traitors to their duties through effeminacy of spirit, I mean because they shun exertions and trouble. Now it is easy and simple to mark the difference between these cases. For at our seasons of ease, when we have untrammeled freedom of choice, and when nothing debars us from the power of following the course that pleases us best, then pleasure is wholly a matter for our selection and pain for our rejection. On certain occasions however either through the inevitable call of duty or through stress of circumstances, it will often come to pass that we must put pleasures from us and must make no protest against annoyance. So in such cases the principle of selection adopted by the wise man is that he should either by refusing certain pleasures attain to other and greater pleasures or by enduring pains should ward off pains still more severe.

Just for the record Don and I crossposted and we had not seen each other's posts first. It's fascinating to have access to someone who is both a native Greek speaker and well read in Epicurus of whom to ask these questions!

Elli so you do not see any possibility too that a reference to sleeping or slothfulness would not also be a reference to someone "out of limits" in the sense of VS63 referring to errors of seeking too much or too little?

I think I understand your point as to the limits of dictionaries and the associations that come when languages are used natively, so the only other point to clarify would be that the words used do not in some way mirror VS63 in referencing sleep or inaction as a mirror image of the error of profligacy.

If it's not there then it is not there, but St Andre generally does a reasonable job with his translations, so it seems reasonable to ask if he saw something that other non-Greek speakers might have missed, especially since you also disagree with the "sensuality" term that most other translators are using.

Thanks for your comments so far!

Great to hear from you Eoghan! Hope you are doing well!

Thank you Elli! So it looks like you would disagree with both the standard English translations (Bailey for example) and with Peter St. Andre and his reference to sleep or slothfulness.